


Whisper

by ANonsense



Category: Naruto
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt, Family, Gender Dysphoria, Hints at romance, Humor, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Multi, Pre-Series, Secrets, possible triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-17
Updated: 2017-05-24
Packaged: 2018-08-23 02:17:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 44
Words: 3,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8309914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ANonsense/pseuds/ANonsense
Summary: There are some things you just don't tell people...





	1. Naruto

**Author's Note:**

> I based this on the site Whisper, in that it's all written like it's anonymous, and it's all confessions of the characters, regardless of whether or not they're trivial or deep. Be warned: there are possible triggers in this: some of the topics covered (eg. self-harm) are slightly mature themes. I suggest using the format of 'entire work' rather than chapter by chapter, but it's your choice.

            He found it in a bin, just next to a clothes shop. Someone had torn some of the stitches holding the zip in place, so they had obviously decided they couldn't sell it and thrown it away, which was good for him: it is remarkable what sort of things people throw away nowadays. Plain, and unremarkable, but with a hood that could conceal a face, he took it home, hidden under his outside jacket.

            People don't beat up kids in blue hoodies.


	2. Sakura

            Today, she puts on a red dress for the academy. Her best friend picked it out for her in the shops, saying it would make her look less fat than usual. That had meant her best friend had liked it, and so she'd bought it with her own money, even though it was quite expensive. Now she wears it quite a lot. It is the prettiest dress she owns.

            At home, in the privacy of her own house, when she is not trying to impress people, she wears jeans and a vest-top, and has her hair in a beanie so that it doesn't get in the way, but she wears dresses for the Academy, because boys like girls in dresses... don't they?


	3. Sasuke

            When he wakes up in the middle of the night and can't get back to sleep, he walks to the farthest edge of the compound, goes into the house of his (late) second cousin's aunt and tries to get back to sleep in their spare room. It is the only house in the compound he never once visited when its owners were alive.

            If he still can't sleep, there's a futon in the cupboard of his brother's room.


	4. Kakashi

            When he was younger, he had a crush on his sensei. He used to draw hearts in notebooks and then burn the pages of them.

            After his sensei died, he had a crush on an ANBU on his team. The man was younger than him, dark-haired, and calm; nothing like his sensei.

            A few months passed and the boy left the village.

            He stopped having crushes: he took to porn instead.


	5. Iruka

            There's a man who reads porn in the tree by the academy. He hasn't noticed him staring, yet, and hopefully he never will.


	6. Sandaime

            When he turned fourteen, his father said to him 'never smoke: it's not worth it. It kills people.' When he turned sixteen, his father stopped smoking: stopped everything. His heart stopped, so his son stopped listening to him.


	7. Hinata

            She has a secret box up in the attic of the compound. Nobody must know what is in there, not even her father; not even her sister. She has been told from birth she is going to grow up to be the leader of the clan. She has been told from six that she will never be good enough: that she is not worthy. She has been told from eight that, if she fails - which she will - at least she has a sister who is not as weak as she is.

            Now she is sick of them. In the box she has a book on basic fuuinjutsu, a bottle of ink, blank tags and a paintbrush. She has been selling explosive tags to the weapons shops her father buys from since she was ten years old.

            The nice girl who is the shop-owner's daughter, says that, when she walks out on her family, they will happily give her a job.


	8. Kiba

            Two years old, and he ripped up the sofa cushions in the living room with his teeth. Now he is twelve, he is still not allowed on the furniture. The dog is.


	9. Shino

            He takes cold baths in the mornings because his insects like it. They float on the top of the water like they are on sun-loungers and buzz around his head. Occasionally, he has arguments with them over whether he should use the soap.


	10. Akamaru

            Master gets angry.

            Scared. Runs and hides under bed. Bed dark. Bed safe.

            Master comes looking for.

            Runs to curtains. Hides in long curtains. Master will never find.

            Master does find. Master tells off. Master says 'bad dog'.

            Sad. Not ever happy when Master angry. Is sorry. Thinks will never pee on shoes again.

...

            Forgets.


	11. Neji

            It is fate that his life has ended up like this: it must be. Why else would the universe have picked him to be so cruel to? People make fun of him for this opinion, sometimes behind his back, but most of the time openly, to his face.

            He is the clan prodigy, and, as such, should act like one. This is why he doesn't respond immediately. Instead, he just makes a really unlikely prediction, and then walks away. Later, when it is dark and no-one is looking, he sneaks back to wherever they are sleeping, and makes that prediction come true. When he mentions fate around them a second time, they turn white and walk away in the opposite direction.


	12. Lee

            For him, exercise is like bleeding wrists. It hurts, but he likes the pain. It hurts, but he knows he deserves it. It hurts, but it feels better afterwards. People admire him for carrying on with it, and they define him by it, and they tell him it is ludicrous what he does, but everything they say is stupid and useless and wrong. He is not to be admired: it is not praiseworthy. It is not all of him: he is a person, not a machine. It is not ludicrous: it is not inexplicable.

            Exercise hurts him. That's why he does it.


	13. Tenten

            She wants to cut her hair to the skin. It gets in the way of her trajectory, and, when her buns unravel, it takes ages to get them tied properly again, which could make her a burden if it happened in the midst of battle. Her father likes her long hair, though: says it reminds him of her mother.

            One day, she meets a boy who has hair just as long as hers. He wears it down, and fights and spins and twirls and it doesn't bother him. She tells him he is an idiot to his face, and then challenges him to a sparring session.

            She loses.

            Next time she ties up her hair, she hides senbon in it, and throws them at him when he's doing crunches.


	14. Shikamaru

            When he is nine, his doctor tells him he has inherited narcolepsy from his father. She tells him this means he will fall asleep whenever he gets too excited, and will feel doubly tired throughout the day.

            "Troublesome," he says, and leaves the room.

            Three years later, his father tells him the doctor is silly, and that laziness is just part of the family part and parcel. His son rolls his eyes.

            "Troublesome," he says, and leaves the room.

            In truth, he agrees with neither of them.

            His best friend smiles at him, when he admits this.

            "You're not lazy," he says, eating. "You just think a lot."

            Out of all of them, he likes this theory best... mainly because it suggests he can actually be bothered for once.


	15. Ino

            She doesn't actually have a crush. She wants to fit in more than she wants to kiss the dark-haired quiet kid, so she joins in with the other girls' games, and she argues with them, and beats them in fights, and taunts them when they don't win those fights... but it's more for the friendship of the fan-club than for the boy.

            Her best friend (rival) _does_ fancy him, though, and they fight about it lots. It's much more fun than not arguing, that's for sure, and they spend more time together than ever because of it.


	16. Chouji

            His friend tells him about a diet she is doing with another girl in their class. She recommends it to him, saying it would do him good to lose a bit of weight.

            The next day, when he doesn't eat breakfast, his mother sits him down, gives him a good stern talking to, and sends him off to the Academy with an extra-large packed lunch.

            His friend complains. She says he shouldn't have told on her, and that now her father is force-feeding her every mealtime. He doesn't listen. He won't listen to her advice again, no matter how well-intentioned.


	17. Asuma

            Weed isn't something he'd choose to smoke, but he does anyway when his colleagues do it. It feels funny to have a cigarette he hasn't gotten out of a packet, and the woozy feeling he gets from it makes him paranoid and all too antsy for his comfort.

            It tastes horrible, but the taste of the victory it provides him with is sweeter. It's nice to have something his father doesn't know about; that his father can't control. It's nice to know he's made his own decisions, for once.


	18. Kurenai

            When she is not concentrating on missions, her genjutsus become more and more like her latest reading books. Now that a good friend has leant her the first in his favourite porn series, she has stopped taking S-ranks and has applied for a genin team. Hopefully she will have finished reading them by the time she has to teach the kids anything of use.


	19. Gai

            He thinks the 'rivalry' thing helps. It takes his friend's mind off of other things. By acting shallow and stupid, people don't take his challenges for anything more than a little harmless fun... but, when your best friend wants to kill himself most days, he is not above acting stupid if he thinks it helps.

            'Look underneath the underneath', his friend likes to say.

            He thinks his friend suspects.


	20. Anko

            She has one-night stands with lots of people. The nights are long and dirty and full of cheap, kinky sex toys that hurt people. This is what they think she likes, because she is rough and tough around the edges, and she flirts with anything that moves.

            Others stroke her and tell her they love her. These ones she slaps and throws out the house. They are not even one-night stands: most of the time, they do not even have time to take their shoes off. She won't sleep with a man that does that: it reminds her too much of _him_.

            The only two-night stand she ever had was on a seduction mission. The guy was large and broad and scarred, and didn't say anything or do anything except work with her throughout the night towards the same end. It wasn't the target, though; it was her mission partner, and when their target found out she was 'cheating' on him, they failed the mission. They don't talk anymore. She doesn't even visit his department.


	21. Ibiki

            Children scare him. Adults are fine: he knows what they are thinking, and what they want, and what they hide, and, if he doesn't, he finds out with a kunai... but children are different. Children don't think the same way as adults do. Children have innocent games and not-innocent games, which are often the same. Children lie in truths, and tell truths with lies, and don't understand perfectly obvious things, and understand everything they are not meant to, and he doesn't _like_ it. He can't _stand_ not being able to decipher someone from their behaviour and from their words. He can't _stand_ having to meet children he's never met before and not be himself, because he is 'scary' when he acts like himself. He can't stand anything _about_ children.

            When he is told the next chuunin exams will be in the village, he signs up almost as soon as he's able. Revenge is so very sweet.


	22. Gaara

            It is a little known fact, because who could he tell? He is twelve, and already feared. Bloodthirsty and hard to placate. Tempers come and go like sandstorms, and are just as deadly, if not more so. Nobody knows him. So, every night, he can leave without anybody asking him where he goes, and he can walk out into the desert with a canteen of water and a flat dish, and he can squeak through his front teeth without looking like a right fool (nobody's there), and he can set down the dish and pour water into it, and he can watch the lizards scurry out of their burrow and drink from the dish.

            And he won't tell anyone, ever.

            Because nobody's there to tell.


	23. Temari

            She finds chocolate sickening. It melts over her tongue and coats it, and stops up her throat in sweet paste, and tells her to 'shut up, because your father's busy and he has no time for you'. It is an expensive, foreign treat, and she hates it.

            She keeps the wrappers, though: it is the only thing her father buys her.


	24. Shukaku

            Once, when the lands were young and the mountains in different places, he heard singing. It wasn’t like any other sounds he'd ever heard: it was the sound of excess voice, and of happy abandonment and of freedom and song. He had had crept up to listen closer.

            Now the only thing he gets is screaming, and he'll take as much of it as he can get.


	25. Kyuubi

            He is a fox: a rough and tough and tumble fox, with a good humour the same as any living thing. The little brat he lives with (or, rather, shares space with: it's irritating to think about, so he doesn't), is not too much trouble, most of the time, so he hasn't bothered him, yet. Let the kid have a normal childhood and damn the other beasts who don't give a toss. Besides, his pranks are hilarious.


	26. Kankuro

            Once upon a time he woke up in the middle of the night to a shadow on the top of the cupboard. It was a small shadow, about a foot tall, with dead eyes set in white porcelain.

            His mother's doll: the first puppet he ever owned. It's scared the hell out of his sister many a time since.


	27. Sasori

            Secretly; he does it every Sunday. It is like a second skin, which is ironic. His partner likes to experiment on their days off, and, on Sundays, the man leaves to collect whatever he doesn't trust his lackeys to collect, which is everything, so the puppeteer is left alone at the same time each week to do what he wants to do. Every week, it's always the same thing.

            Slipping his core into the section he's hollowed out of his first body, it is almost a relief to feel again, and he makes use of it. His partner thinks he fiddles with puppets.

            That's almost true.


	28. Deidara

            Every day, he gets up very early and straightens his hair. Blonde and frizzy does not get a jounin respect.


	29. Itachi

            His partner never asks him to decide upon the routes they take to get places. It is an ongoing argument - albeit an unspoken one - because neither one can agree on a proper course of action. Is it, or isn't it, a perfectly normal thing to do to go three countries out of your way for a few minutes of watching your little brother sleep?


	30. Kisame

            When he was very much younger, his father locked him in a room without water and told him to shut up and bear it. He’d been ready for it, though: as one might plan for a zombie apocalypse, he had planned for a runaway. To his mother he left photos. To his father, ten gallons of water just behind the living-room door. ‘Turn the other cheek’ say patient people. Since everybody finds his cheeks creepy and unnatural, he likes doing precisely that.


	31. Hidan

            He used to be a wimp. Now he isn’t. He’ll never be a fucking wimp again. Pain used to keep him chained. Now he keeps others chained with it. Can’t they see? Can’t they see he’s releasing them? The pain, the suffering all goes away once it has been endured for as long as he has endured it. If they were fucking brave enough to stop chickening out every time they got a bruise…!

            (It’s like Stockholm Syndrome, he thinks during his quieter moments.)


	32. Kakuzu

            He can’t have kids. Maybe that’s why he’s so careful in all that he does: because it’s fulfilment, in a way. He can’t pass on his genes, so he keeps himself alive so they’re not lost. He keeps his money safe because… because money is another type of security, isn’t it? If he can’t find peace of mind through passing on his legacy; through playing happy families; through being the best he can be (there’s always someone better), money is the best he can do, isn’t it? If his goal can’t be happiness, at least he can spend his life doing good to his pocket.


	33. Pein

            It is quite hard to claim to be of a different religion when you are yourself a god. This is why he puts ‘agnostic’ down on all his census forms. It’s philosophically true, anyway, and adding ‘worships self’ into the ‘Other’ section is just a bit too much trouble than it’s worth.


	34. Konan

            When she goes shopping, she always makes sure to buy a pack of A5 printing paper. Most people’s makeovers cost thousands of ryo. Hers cost less than a half-price kunai.


	35. Tobi

            He tries so hard… It is just, sometimes, he gets fed up walking everywhere, and, sometimes, when he appears in the middle of a crowd, everyone around him can’t help being surprised. He is sorry. He is always very, very sorry. He does try.

            (And, yes; it gets them every time.)


	36. Zetsu

            He has a yearly pass to his homeland’s predominant bee farm. Wild-flowers aren’t particularly picky, after all, and the honey is a nice bonus.


	37. Jiraiya

            He doesn’t get on with women. He is apparently ‘too immature’. This stings, in some ways, so he only has one-night-stands and little things here and there: he won’t dig himself too deep a hole to fall into. Not again. If he doesn’t hope, he can’t be hurt, right? (He’ll stay away from her, even so.)


	38. Tsunade

            She’s not going to get involved in men again. It went badly last time, and it’ll go badly again. This is why she drinks. Men come up to her, and try, and fail, and the drink helps her laugh it all off, because she can’t let them get to her again. The drink obscures the earnestness in their faces, and the leering gestures, and the frowns. The drink obscures it all. She’ll sail through life on a sake dish and be dry-eyed until the boat sinks. She’s not going to go giving her heart away anymore, so they can all go hang!


	39. Orochimaru

            He is a philosopher: a lover of knowledge. People just get in the way of this. People draw invisible lines, and debate endlessly about the fairness of this and that. He takes a more practical point of view: if a tree falls in the forest when no-one is around to hear it, does it really make a sound?


	40. Konohamaru

            When he is grown up, some day, he wants to be invisible. His title is too gaudy and his teachers like to wave it from the rooftops before they even ask him about it. If he can’t be seen for himself, then he’d rather not be seen. So, when he is grown up some day, he wants to be invisible. (In some ways, he already is.)


	41. Kabuto

            He doesn’t like blood much. He pretends he does, because people in medical facilities are meant to like blood, right? Ninja are, certainly… His sensei certainly does… But he doesn’t like blood. He avoids it as much as he possibly can. Maybe in the future he will do something different. Maybe he will be a shop assistant? Or a zoo-keeper?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I hope you liked it! If you can think of anyone else you'd like to see here, or even have an idea for another character, then send me a message and I'll see what I can do. I'd love to hear your feedback!


	42. A

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to CopperN13 for requesting this. :)

Not many people choose their siblings.

(He did. He walked up to the small child one day and chose him. They’ve stayed that way since.)

He sometimes regrets his choice. His brother crashes through windows, disturbs meetings, raps with terrible constancy, talks to himself enough to alarm people (except it’s not to himself, it’s to his pet monster, and that’s something he doesn’t want to think about…), is diplomatically useless and insults guests to the village on a regular basis, is overly familiar with his employees, throws swords into furniture, makes wince-worthy puns, and never does anything to help with the paperwork that piles up on his brother’s desk…

(But he doesn’t regret it really. Those are just empty words he sometimes says. He doesn’t regret his choice of sibling at all: what he regrets is his lack of regret on the subject. (He hopes no-one notices that he’s got a soft side: he’d never live it down.))


	43. Killer B

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thank you to CopperN13 for requesting this and suggesting ideas.

Jinchuuriki are hated, slated, berated. He knows this. More than that, he chose this: volunteered to give tenancy to the eight-tailed menace, but he’s not an object.

Stares, glares, wariness, every day, every variation, every way. He’ll stay in the village because he has to stay, but it would be nice some day for them to realise that he’s not corrupted.

People with their out-loud stating of blatant hatred, he can interrupt with a ‘hey!’ and correct them, but he raps because he is a person with a beast sealed in him and their silence, that tells him he’s a monster, won’t be silenced, can’t be silenced, won’t go away. He’s not a monster, not in any way.

And rapping is an out-pouring of emotion, so he devotes himself to it, because he’ll prove to them that he’s not an object, and he wants people to know this, and for it to stay that way. Emotion is something that objects can’t express. Rapping is a way of speaking feeling; it’s for people to use as a mode of address. Objects can’t feel so they can’t rap. Spoken poetry’s a resource they can’t tap. (And, at heart, he just wants to impress them, not be less to them than a person, and that’s that.)


	44. Sai

He is a boy. He is. He has a penis and no breasts. That’s a boy, isn’t it?

He’s not got a name, but he has got a sex. He’s a boy. That’s one thing he can claim for his own. A boy. Yes.

(His brother told him he was anyway, and that’s what it says on all the forms.)


End file.
